Multi-State Online Professional Development ToolKit

Changing professional development and meeting teacher needs

MOPD - A Model for Online Professional Development

Evaluation

This section of the ToolKit provides information about how others evaluate online courses and programs, what should be considered in course and program evaluation and methods of collecting and analyzing evaluative data. This page provides easy access to documents, Web sites and other materials that contain up-to-date and reliable information to assist in planning and developing online courses.

The Age of Our Accountability
http://www.nsdc.org/library/publications/jsd/guskey194.cfm
This article describes purposes for professional development evaluation as well as critical stages or levels of evaluation. Twelve guidelines are presented to help ensure a meaningful evaluation.

Assessing Impact: Evaluating Staff Development
http://www.nsdc.org/connect/projects/ai1-4.pdf
Well-written in understandable language, this article by Joellen Killion of the National Staff Development Council (2001), is an excellent resource guide for evaluating the impact of professional development regardless of delivery method.

Creating Learning Environments for Adults: The Role of Technology
http://www.literacyonline.org/products/ncal/pdf/NCF97.pdf
Beginning on Page 4 of the National Center for Adult Literacy (NCAL) Connections, this article provides an overview of the characteristics, goals and contexts of adult learners.

Entering the Mainstream: the Quality and Extent of Online Education in the United States, 2003 and 2004. I. Elaine Allen and Jeff Seaman. The Sloan Consortium. 2004. http://www.sloan-c.org/resources/survey.asp
This work represents the second annual study of the state of online education in U. S. Higher Education.  Based on responses from over 1,100 colleges and universities, it addresses such questions as: Will online enrollments continue their rapid growth? Are students as satisfied with online courses as they are with face-to-face instruction? What role do schools see online learning playing in their long term strategy? What about the quality of online offerings, do schools continue to believe that it measures up?

Essential Principles of Quality
http://www.sreb.org/programs/edtech/pubs/pdf/Principles_of_Quality_Checklist.pdf 
This checklist is based on the SREB Essential Principles of Quality and is designed to assist states and schools in determining the quality and effectiveness of Web-based courses.  

E-Learning for Educators: Implementing the Standards for Professional Development
http://www.nsdc.org/library/authors/e-learning.pdf
This guide was developed to assist educational leaders in the review, selection, development, and evaluation of online professional development. The document contains a framework of guiding questions that are based on the National Staff Development Council's Standards for Staff Development.

Evaluating Distributed Learning in Metropolitan Universities
http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/eqm01412.pdf 
This is a summary of the University of Central Florida's examination of student and teacher issues in an online environment. The summary, basically an extended abstract, is a quick read.

Five Levels of Professional Development Evaluation
http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/methods/technlgy/te10lk18.htm
This article presents a summary of the five levels of professional development evaluation that are proposed by Guskey in The Age of Our Accountability. These hierarchical levels are helpful for determining the success of professional development.

The IQ Project: Investigating Quality of Online Courses
www.iqstandards.info
This Web site provides a description of a Texas project developed to evaluate the quality of online courses for students. The project can serve as a guide for the development of models to evaluate the quality of online professional development.

Keys to Quality. Sheryl Nussbaum-Beach and John Norton.  Access Learning. July-August 2004. http://www.ciconline.org/AboutCIC/Publications/Archives/AL_julaug04.htm
The authors pose five questions to ask before you choose an online professional development provider.

Quality Online Teaching
http://www.sreb.org/programs/EdTech/pubs/Quality_Online_Teaching.asp
This publication looks at the skills required to be an online K-12 teacher. Although the essential qualities and the checklist are primarily for K-12 teachers, they can be adapted for instructors of professional development.

Planning for Evaluation
http://www.seirtec.org/_evaluation/eval_index.html
This collection of tools and resources is useful for helping educators plan evaluations.

Staff Development: Adult Characteristics
http://www-ed.fnal.gov/lincon/staff_adult.shtml
A chart comparing some general characteristic differences between adults and children as learners is contained on this page.

Using Quality Assurance for Online Programs
http://www.aace.org/pubs/etr/issue3/Lee.pdf 
The article proposes a quality assurance design for university online courses. The five elements of the design could be applicable in creating online professional development.

 

For more information, e-mail Bill Thomas at bthomas@sreb.org.